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The science

New places make days you remember

Days spent moving through more varied places go with a better mood, and time spent in routine is remembered as shorter. A trip of new lanes, sounds and faces is the opposite of routine.

Evidence: Moderate

Well-designed studies, but correlational, and the GPS study is about everyday life at home, not travel.

What the studies show

In a study in New York and Miami, people were tracked by GPS for three to four months. On days when they moved through more varied places, they reported more positive mood, and the link was stronger in people whose hippocampus and striatum (memory and reward areas) were more connected.

In experiments and field studies, including holidaymakers at a resort, time spent in routine was remembered as shorter, and non-routine time as longer. That is the peer-reviewed side of the popular idea that a holiday flies by but feels long afterwards.

A 2021 meta-analysis of 141 studies found that experiences make people a little happier than possessions (d = 0.38), with about a third of that possibly due to publication bias. The edge shows mostly as feeling connected to others, and one study found no edge at all for people with less money.

In Morocco

Few places pack more variety into a walk than the medina of Fes: a maze of lanes, workshops grouped by trade, a call to prayer, a different smell at every corner. A route that changes landscape (Fes to the desert, the desert to the coast) adds variety at the scale of days.

Where it stops

  • The GPS study is correlational and about everyday movement at home. It does not show that novelty causes happiness, or that travel does.
  • "Novelty rewires your brain" is not what the study found.
  • The experiences-over-things advantage is real but modest, and smaller than early studies suggested.
Sources, checked 2026-11-14
  1. Heller et al. (2020). Association between real-world experiential diversity and positive affect relates to hippocampal–striatal functional connectivity. Nature Neuroscience 23
  2. Avni-Babad & Ritov (2003). Routine and the perception of time. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 132(4)
  3. Weingarten & Goodman (2021). Re-examining the experiential advantage in consumption: a meta-analysis and review. Journal of Consumer Research 47(6)
  4. Lee, Hall & Wood (2018). Experiential or material purchases? Social class determines purchase happiness. Psychological Science 29(7)
  5. Van Boven & Gilovich (2003). To do or to have? That is the question. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 85(6)

More of the science

Holidays and happinessThe lift is real, small and short. Looking forward to it counts too.Winter sunMarrakech gets about four times London's December sun. What that does and doesn't mean.Awe in the dunesAwe is a well-studied emotion. Vast places reliably trigger it.The Milky WayMost Europeans can't see it from home. In the Sahara you can.The sea, and surfingCoast visits go with feeling better. Surf therapy: too early to say.Walking in the AtlasA walk in nature lifts mood for hours. Toubkal also means altitude.The hammamNo study has tested it. What sauna research does and doesn't say.Tea with strangersTalking to strangers feels better than people expect. Sharing food builds trust.Other cultures and creativityLiving abroad is linked to creativity. A short trip wasn't.A few words of DarijaNo proven brain boost. Still the best way to start a conversation.Couples and familiesNew things together help in the short term. A trip won't fix a relationship.

Plan it

FesThe oldest medina, lane by laneA first tripA route through very different places

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